My dumbphone has predictive text and lets me add words it doesn't have in its dictionary, but it "forgets" them every few months. This includes the dirty words. I feel naughty teaching my phone to cuss.

My dumbphone has predictive text and lets me add words it doesn't have in its dictionary, but it "forgets" them every few months. This includes the dirty words. I feel naughty teaching my phone to cuss.

But the fact that you have to is proof that at least one autocorrect has, in its algorithm (or whatever), a bias against suggesting those words. Though, darling has proof that it can happen spontaneously.

My dumbphone has predictive text and lets me add words it doesn't have in its dictionary, but it "forgets" them every few months. This includes the dirty words. I feel naughty teaching my phone to cuss.

But the fact that you have to is proof that at least one autocorrect has, in its algorithm (or whatever), a bias against suggesting those words. Though, darling has proof that it can happen spontaneously.

My phone is not anything like the smartphones shown on those sites, though. And it's missing all sorts of normal words too--I've had to teach it "snuggle" repeatedly, for example. It's just a low-budget phone that is probably powered by a little dinosaur running in a wheel inside it. I've seen enough dirty autocorrects on DYAC that I think those types of phones have a much spicier vocabulary built in.

My dumbphone has predictive text and lets me add words it doesn't have in its dictionary, but it "forgets" them every few months. This includes the dirty words. I feel naughty teaching my phone to cuss.

I had a word processor spellcheck similar to that - I could add words to the dictionary if the dictionary didn't have them already. Most of what I added was technical terminology (I was using it to write up acoustic lab reports, for the most part), but I did discover, when I subsequently reviewed the dictionary, that at some point I'd taught it a variety of swear words in English, German, French and (best of all) Klingon.

And in the vein of "stop helping me", I give to you the Microsoft Office Assistant.

I have painful memories of compiling a series of 30 graphs in Excel for a lab report and for each one that blasted paperclip popped up to say "I see you are drawing a graph - would you like some help?" And no amount of telling it to go away/closing it/cursing the university IT Drone who'd thought it was a good idea to install it in the first place would convince it that no, I REALLY didn't need any help with my graphs thankyouverymuch.

My dumbphone has predictive text and lets me add words it doesn't have in its dictionary, but it "forgets" them every few months. This includes the dirty words. I feel naughty teaching my phone to cuss.

I had a word processor spellcheck similar to that - I could add words to the dictionary if the dictionary didn't have them already. Most of what I added was technical terminology (I was using it to write up acoustic lab reports, for the most part), but I did discover, when I subsequently reviewed the dictionary, that at some point I'd taught it a variety of swear words in English, German, French and (best of all) Klingon.

And in the vein of "stop helping me", I give to you the Microsoft Office Assistant.

I have painful memories of compiling a series of 30 graphs in Excel for a lab report and for each one that blasted paperclip popped up to say "I see you are drawing a graph - would you like some help?" And no amount of telling it to go away/closing it/cursing the university IT Drone who'd thought it was a good idea to install it in the first place would convince it that no, I REALLY didn't need any help with my graphs thankyouverymuch.

CRUD MONKEYS!, the paper clip. The paper clip.

As for word processor spellcheck, you should see all the imaginary words mine knew when I was writing Harry Potter fanfic.

I have had some funny autocorrects - none obscene though, and I just haven't caught them before i pressed send. My personal favourite is when I was texting someone about the fact that 'some 'gitface'' had called me at 2am with a silent call. My phone changed the word 'gitface' to 'giraffe'.

Much hilarity ensued as we wondered why a giraffe would be calling at 2 am and a silent call at that, and also whether he would be called Geoffrey (Toys R Us fame). The conversation then went on to speculate whether all giraffes were evil and whether they were all called Geoffrey...

I tried to send a text to my sister about a tentative date for a family event. Autocorrect changed it to "tentative fatwa".

Still not sure where that came from--I swear I am not in the habit of issuing fatwas. Although, as someone pointed out, those are rarely tentative.

That reminds me, my mother took me to a Clinique counter when I was a preteen and was interested in makeup but didn't know how to put it on. They sold us a bunch of skin care products, but also the woman showed me how to apply it but I really did NOT like the look. Seriously, anytime I've ever had a Clinique makeover I walk away from the counter wearing a lot more makeup than I usually do and feeling like I ought to be picking out a corner to stand on, if you catch my drift.

I had wanted to get some idea for how to get a simple look, so that it would seem like I was barely wearing anything. Some days all I wear for makeup is foundation, blush and tinted gloss and some shadow.

This happened to my sister but not at Clinique. A department store had a free make-up event and she asked for the natural look. She wanted to look like she's not wearing makeup, just stuff to make her skin clearer and maybe eyes and lips brighter. What she ended up with looks like she can join you on that corner. I tried to be nice and said the makeup may be OK for a night out. The makeup person said that's a daytime look and looked at us like we were hicks.

When we left the store, we overheard one of the other makeup person tell her client that the Kardashian look is in. We looked around and all the customers had the same thick heavy mask-like makeup look. We figured all the "artists" were instructed to give that look no matter what the customer wanted (or maybe that's all they were taught). We had to cut our shopping time short to go home so my sister can wash her face; she was so embarrassed to walk through the mall looking like that. We laugh and joke about the experience (and that company) now.

We were having trouble with blown fuses. I would text the landlord, with information about which fuse had blown etc, and did not notice that autocorrect had chanced fuse into another word of the same length starting with fu.

My sister got a business text once from a work colleague that used the term 'f/u.' She was momentarily shocked, then she realized it was meant to stand for "follow up."

I don't really want to admit how many times that happens to me but lets just go with every single time. I see it go "what? why are you telling me...oh wait...you mean, right I know that", and I see it a lot. But my brain just dances over to the bad place.

That reminds me, my mother took me to a Clinique counter when I was a preteen and was interested in makeup but didn't know how to put it on. They sold us a bunch of skin care products, but also the woman showed me how to apply it but I really did NOT like the look. Seriously, anytime I've ever had a Clinique makeover I walk away from the counter wearing a lot more makeup than I usually do and feeling like I ought to be picking out a corner to stand on, if you catch my drift.

I had wanted to get some idea for how to get a simple look, so that it would seem like I was barely wearing anything. Some days all I wear for makeup is foundation, blush and tinted gloss and some shadow.

This happened to my sister but not at Clinique. A department store had a free make-up event and she asked for the natural look. She wanted to look like she's not wearing makeup, just stuff to make her skin clearer and maybe eyes and lips brighter. What she ended up with looks like she can join you on that corner. I tried to be nice and said the makeup may be OK for a night out. The makeup person said that's a daytime look and looked at us like we were hicks.

When we left the store, we overheard one of the other makeup person tell her client that the Kardashian look is in. We looked around and all the customers had the same thick heavy mask-like makeup look. We figured all the "artists" were instructed to give that look no matter what the customer wanted (or maybe that's all they were taught). We had to cut our shopping time short to go home so my sister can wash her face; she was so embarrassed to walk through the mall looking like that. We laugh and joke about the experience (and that company) now.

Almost happened to me too, first time I went to a makeup counter to have a makeover before starting my first grown-up job, mostly to learn what colors worked for me. I had to explain several times to the makeup person that I wanted the lightest possible makeup. I about blew her mind when I told her that not only did I not currently wear foundation, I had no plans to start, so she should skip that step entirely.

I'll add well-meaning hairdressers who decide to "help" by giving me a blowout hairstyle. With a blowout, my hair texture, and my face shape, somehow I always end up looking like a 1980s anchorwoman or Princess Di.

I have had some funny autocorrects - none obscene though, and I just haven't caught them before i pressed send. My personal favourite is when I was texting someone about the fact that 'some 'gitface'' had called me at 2am with a silent call. My phone changed the word 'gitface' to 'giraffe'.

Much hilarity ensued as we wondered why a giraffe would be calling at 2 am and a silent call at that, and also whether he would be called Geoffrey (Toys R Us fame). The conversation then went on to speculate whether all giraffes were evil and whether they were all called Geoffrey...

I tried to send a text to my sister about a tentative date for a family event. Autocorrect changed it to "tentative fatwa".

Still not sure where that came from--I swear I am not in the habit of issuing fatwas. Although, as someone pointed out, those are rarely tentative.

Random Guy at the gas station, tried to stop me from getting my car washed because it is going to rain. Kept telling me you don't want to do that.

I finally told him - 1. My car has 1/4 inch of oak pollen on it2. The pollen how has dirt road clay dust on top of it3. I want to get that rinsed off before I get caught in drizzle that turns it into cement like coating on the car.4. For the last two days I've been dealing with the insanity called STAAR (they are testing in the room next door so I have to keep my 2nd graders silent)5. I nearly stepped on this (Don't click if you don't like reptiles with fangs. Family is debating if it is a cottonmouth or rattler yes. This was taken after I jumped back about 5 feet and I used the zoom) 30 min ago at the farm.

I had to laugh when a Hair Cuttery gal tried to upsell me by offering to straighten my already straight hair.

Another time I got the manager who decided to get me to purchase their deep conditioning treatment by talking about how dry my hair was due to coloring it myself. I had my hair colored at one of their salons in the past and the list of reds they'd use on my hair was quite limited due to me having naturally brown hair and not wanting it bleached, first.

One of the other stylists walked past my chair and said "Hey, I like the hair color!" (I've been coloring it burgundy, recently) right after I'd said "No thanks!" I always go in there with an exact amount I'm willing to spend and have never let them talk me up.

Logged

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars. You have a right to be here. Be cheerful, strive to be happy. -Desiderata

Speaking of stop helping me. I hate auto correct. It never corrects to anything that I am trying to and apparently the word "three" doesn't exist. I get the, thee, fee, few and even when I type three very slowly out, it still tries to correct it to thee most of the time.

My Android phone doesn't believe "you" is more common than "thou". I use Swype and even if I'm very precise about spelling "you", it'll show up as "thou". I'm not sure why "thou" was even programmed into the dictionary! Also, I haven't been able to teach it my name, despite having had it for almost a year.